Swaziland

Micaela Serafini, MSF medical referent, discusses MSF’s efforts to treat HIV/AIDS in Swaziland.

Once "more dead than alive," a woman living with HIV in Swaziland's remote Shiselweni region is now healthy and trying to help others who are where she once was.

Every day, Senzo wakes up and walks to catch a bus to the clinic for his daily injection. The injection is part of the complicated two-year-long treatment for his drug-resistant form of TB.

Real stories of people living with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. Today's feature from Swaziland: "I do get a lot of emotional support from my family, but financially we are struggling."

While several countries hardest hit by HIV/AIDS are improving treatment protocols to reduce deaths and illness, a lack of donor support still prevents many from implementing vital changes.

Several low-income countries highly affected by HIV risk being entirely or partly disqualified from the current funding round by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

The dual epidemic of tuberculosis and HIV is devastating Swaziland, cutting life expectancy there from 60 to just 31 years of age, MSF said today in a new report.

In Swaziland a dual epidemic of tuberculosis (TB) and HIV is threatening to wipe out entire generations. The country has the highest HIV prevalence in the world among adults, coupled with one of the highest incidence rates of TB. The great majority of TB patients are co-infected with HIV, and TB is the leading cause of mortality among HIV-positive patients.

In South Africa, where the FIFA World Cup is getting under way, MSF is trying to show that beating HIV/AIDS should be the ultimate goal.

Malawi has been facing its biggest measles epidemic in 13 years. Working with the local health authorities, MSF has launched a vaccination campaign for more than 2.5 million children.

By the time Lindo was three years old, she had developed a constant cough and breathing problems and was too weak to walk

At one time, TB was considered on its way to being eradicated. However, the disease started a frightening comeback beginning in the 1980s and lasting through the present day.

Participants at an International Consultative Workshop that took place at the end of October in Swaziland have come up with a series of recommendations to improve and increase the response to the alarming dual epidemic of HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (TB) that is claiming thousands of lives every year in the Southern African region and in Swaziland in particular.

“I understand what other patients are going through because, after all, I am also a patient. I take a minimum of 15 pills each day just to fight against drug-resistant TB."

MSF doctor Hermann Reuter works in a tuberculosis (TB) project in a rural district of Swaziland called Shiselweni.

Swaziland in Southern Africa is on the brink of a major health crisis due to the killer twin epidemic of HIV-AIDS and TB.

Nikiwe, 30 years old, was diagnosed in early 2009 with drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB). Here, he talks about the daily struggle of being infected and the shame he feels living with his illness in a fearful community.